Sergio Garcia, young buck of the golfing world, kicked over the traces yesterday. After six months of almost continuous success, his season suffered a resounding setback when, in the first round here, he was beaten by the South African Retief Goosen.

But in a match of quite sensational scoring, a moment of teenage tee rage overshadowed the action. And in a week when the Garcia swing has been called into question, so too was his temperament, or, maybe more accurately, his temper.

The incident occurred on the 15th tee and signalled a moment of pure frustration for the 19-year-old Spaniard, which he relieved in unacceptable fashion. Two down at the time, he went for a big drive and felt his right foot slip just before the moment of impact. The ball hurtled into the trees and, seconds later, Garcia's right shoe, which he had wrenched angrily from his foot, hurtled into an advertising board at the back of the tee box.

His manager, Jose Marquina, picked it up and tossed it back, whereupon Garcia, like the striker he is with his local football club, pivoted and kicked it with some force. It might have been funny but for the fact that it shot up into the air and actually hit his caddie, Jerry Higginbotham.

Garcia then replaced the shoe, hit another drive which went even deeper into the trees, and then threw his driver at the blameless Higginbotham who, as this second missile arrowed its way towards him, just had time to duck.

The match ended two holes later with Goosen the 2 and 1 winner, and the Spaniard was immediately repentant. "Yes," he said, "I am sorry. I won't be doing it again. I know I am a role model for some young players and I should not be showing them that. But I am not doing it every day, you know that.

"On a normal day I probably would not do it. But in that round I had six birdies and an eagle and still I was two down. And it was not the first time this week I had slipped. Altogether there have been about five times."

Garcia, having handed over the offending footwear to a young spectator, revealed that he is going to ask Adidas to modify the soles, which at present have projections which, in effect, reduce the length of his standard metal spikes.

It was a pity that what had been one of this event's great scoring matches was thus spoiled. Between them, in 70 holes, Goosen and Garcia had 21 birdies and two eagles and the latter, having been one down at lunch, went to the turn in 30, five under par, and remained one down.

Goosen, who lost the first two holes of the match and wondered at that stage "whether I was going to be one of those 9 and 8 losers" kept his head admirably and was 11 under par for the day when he won.

The Garcia incident overshadowed the effort from Padraig Harrington, who recorded the most comprehensive victory of the day. The Dubliner surprised even himself by demolishing Paraguay's Carlos Franco 7 and 6. Harrington's morning 65 was better than any round he has produced in the Volvo PGA championship on the same West Course and he did not waste it.

The 28-year-old then went to the turn in 32 and when the match finished three holes later he was a brilliant 11 under par.

"I expected it to go the full distance," he said. "But today was my final and it's going to be difficult to get my concentration as good again to face Ernie (Els).

"For 19 holes Carlos played perfect golf, but I was two up and somehow I grinded him down. I think he felt he needed to do a little bit more and he started making mistakes."

The only seed to survive the opening round was Australian Craig Parry, who was just too steady for British Open champion Paul Lawrie in winning 4 and 3 and now faces defending champion Mark O'Meara.

A virus-ridden Jose-Maria Olazabal lost to the native American Notah Begay, who sportingly admitted that playing the game was very difficult when "you have no energy, a headache and can't swallow".